I arrived in The Hague from Delft in the late afternoon. As it is about 2 hours from Nijmegen to this part of the country, I figured I’d stay the night to save myself the commuting time. My AirBnB was steps from where my bus dropped me off, and I met with my lovely and welcoming hosts, who offered me a glass of wine and for me to join them for dinner later in the evening. I had a few hours to kill before dinner, so I took a walk in the area. The city felt much more like a city than the other places I’d been to–a little grittier, busier and more diverse.

I planned to take the weekend in the eastern part of the Netherlands, specifically Delft and The Hague. Armed with free wifi on the trains (which I love) and some train station snacks, it was a very pleasant, sun-soaked two hours to Delft. I had intended to leave my overnight bag at the train station, as I would be going onto the Hague later in the day but their lockers were not available. Thankfully, I remembered reading that one could leave luggage at the tourist office, so I made my way into town.

On the road again! I have the great pleasure to be visiting the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in Nijmegen, Netherlands for a 3-week research trip. While I do plan on getting (hopefully) a fair bit of work done while I'm here, it won't be all work and no play. Things won't be in full swing until Monday, so I took the opportunity to do a bit of exploring of the town I'll be calling home for the next 3 weeks.

One of the first things on my list for the day was to catch the number 28 tram. This famed tram route starts in Baixa and climbs up the steep hill into Alfama (which is what most people ride it for) before it heads back down the hill and out into westward districts. I had read that this was a highlight of any Lisbon visit, so naturally I figured I’d check it out. I was warned that lines could get long, so try to get there earlier rather than later. Well, mid-morning certainly wasn’t early enough, as there was already a lengthy queue.

My first full day of Lisbon was actually not spent in Lisbon itself but in a town not far away called Sintra. This place is particularly notable for bursting with palaces and villas. I had bought my train ticket the evening before (4.80 round trip!), so I showed up to the station and just hopped right on the train. Now I knew that Sintra was a popular destination for day-trippers from Lisbon, myself included, but I wasn’t quite expecting the sheer volume that I would encounter.

I had a relatively early train to catch, but I was thankfully only a 5 minute walk to the station. I popped into a bakery just outside the station to grab a couple custard tarts for the road (they ended up being some of the tastiest I'd had yet, probably because they were still fresh!) and went in to find my train. I needed to go just one stop and then change trains to board one bound for Lisbon. I had managed to book a single seat (rather than a seat part of a pair of seats) on my Lisbon-bound train, so I had at least a bit of room and quiet for the roughly 2.5 hour trip.

After a relatively lazy start to my day, I headed off in search of Porto's famed Majestic Café. Opened in 1921, it is a pretty little spot living in the splendour of the Belle Epoque era, with marble table tops, gorgeously engraved leather banquettes and liveried waiters. I ordered their "Majestic" French toast along with a pastel de nata and a hot chocolate, and happily people-watched while I ate my tasty treats. I didn't mind that most were other tourists because the interiors were pretty enough to keep me occupied (and the goings-on of other tourists is always fascinating).

Porto would be the first stop in a brand new country for me! I know very little about Portugal--their culture and even their food (other than their famed egg tarts, I don't know that I've ever had Portuguese food). I usually take the opportunity afforded by getting airfare covered to attend an academic conference to wander for a week or so afterwards. I had literally stared at a map of Europe to consider where to go after Glasgow and thought that a sunny sojourn in southern Europe (particularly after the veritable fall-like weather in Scotland) sounded like a brilliant idea. Hence, Portugal!

My lovely collaborator and hotel roommate Susanne Brouwer had suggested going on one of the conference-suggested day tours, and I was happy for the chance to get out of the city for a day. Organized by Rabbie’s, it was a small, 16-person tour (including several friends from the conference) that took us to Culzean Castle and along the Ayrshire Coast.

I feel like we have had the opportunity to eat and drink at some wonderful establishments and the good fortune of seeing some amazing things here. However, this is the third-largest city in the US, and as such, there is a wealth of unexplored territory. We've started creating a Chicago bucket list filled with all the things we'd like to see and do and eat, either for the first time or re-visited, before we leave.

It was with a bit of a heavy heart that we awoke, as we knew it was our last day of our vacation in Québec. We had a fairly modest day planned and spent the morning packing our bags, doing laundry and tidying up the apartment. I’d made reservations for a noon brunch at Le Clocher Penché, which was reputed to be one of the best places to get brunch in town. It was located down in the Saint-Roch area of town, formerly a working-class industrial district that had recently been refurbished and spruced up with shops and fun new restaurants.